Erasing Death
by Gesirdris
Summary: Draco has a second mission in his 6th year: to harm Harry. He finds a convoluted way of succeeding, and now Harry is dying. Before his death, he decides to find a better way to fight – and what can teach him better than a school in the Other Realm, where creatures rule and teach forgotten lore? NO bashing! OMC/Harry, Grey!Harry, Ron, Hermione.
1. Sick Doesn't Equal Shattered

Disclaimer: the canon belongs to J. K. Rowling, of course.

Summary: Draco has another mission in his 6th year. He finds a convoluted way of succeeding, and now Harry is dying. Before his death, he decides to find a better way to fight – and what can teach him better than a school in the Other Realm, where creatures rule and study magic that Harry's very being finds abhorrent? Well, beggars can't be choosers. If he wants to win, he has to deal with it. Along the way, he doesn't notice that he has plunged into this other world neck-deep, and that returning to the hostile and flighty ways of wizards to live away the meagre time he has doesn't appeal to him anymore...

Pairings: Harry/some creature hottie. Although I can hook him up with a canon character, too, no? If you ask for it really-really-really- nicely :p

Notes: Yay for an another-school story that _doesn't_ involve Dumbles/Ron/Hermione-bashin'!

The Other Realm is intertwined with humans, so I hope to keep a nice balance between two worlds, without forgetting all about canon. Also, Harry going to Arianrhod doesn't mean he's so awesome that he'll beat all Des in a pulp after a week of attendance. Let's be realistic here, people!

Also, I don't have any set-in-stone plans for this story, only the brief outlines, some characters' personalities, the description of how some cool magicks work, and some other stuff.

But worry not, I know the ending!

Half of the credit for this story goes to my lovely friend and neighbour Vallory Russups. It's her starting story that inspired me (and I've seen the whole version, beyond what she's posted for now), so I asked her for some props... She gave me a bunch of sheets and notebooks with an alternative story, some descriptions of colourful chars and small things that don't really fit in her own fic. And that's how this story came to be!

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H

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Prologue. Sick Doesn't Equal Shattered.

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When Harry woke up, it was to a floating scent of tears and to the drawn curtains of the infirmary, uncommonly dark and heavy. An invisible weight pressed on his chest; he couldn't rise. His glasses lay discarded somewhere, so the usual smudges prevented him from deciphering the hunched figure at his bedside, which stifled its quiet whimpers and sobs by biting the back of its hand.

Yet, the voice was familiar. Hermione.

Harry made an effort to get up, only to have his hand grabbed by another one, and to feel a gentle push on his shoulder that prompted him to lie down again. A shove of familiar glasses on his nose – and the world clicked into place.

The first thing Harry witnessed was the lovely face of his best friend distorted by emotional agony and muddled by trails of tears.

"I'm so happy you are awake now," she whispered. However soft it was, the hushed sound pierced through the ominous silence of the infirmary.

Harry tried for a smile. It came out twisted.

"Hey, can't laze around forever, can I now? The Dursleys would have a hissy fit if they found out how much time I actually spend every year resting after some hare-brained adventure instead of making myself useful. They'd probably think it blasphemous."

The smile slid off when Hermione cuffed the back of his head. His vision swam again at the blow, and however much Harry attempted to avoid showing the impact, Hermione noticed his discomfort. She always noticed uncomfortable things.

"Sorry," the mutter fell from her lips. "I didn't mean to- It's just so hard, you know, after everything that has happened- We didn't know if you would awaken."

"Oh." He scratched the back of his head. He was feeling perfect. Just swell. Dumbledore, on the other hand... His eyes burned. "Where is Ron?"

"Doing what he's always doing, I guess! Moping about, where else?" Hermione huffed, taking Harry aback, before she deflated and shook her head in a grief-stricken manner. "At least now he has a reason to. It hit him the hardest, Harry, you know? When Madame Pomfrey notified us of your condition, you should have seen his face! Never before had I witnessed so much sorrow-"

She gulped down her tears. Seeing Ron like that, blaming himself for his friend's condition, because they could have prevented it, could have supported Harry's "insane" Malfoy's-a-Death-Eater idea, could have noticed the signs of it earlier and acted on it...

They hadn't.

Too centred on themselves and delving into that insecure, fragile bond between them, too unwilling to believe the obvious, they had allowed their best friend to fall to that vile magic-induced sickness.

Hermione blamed herself no less than Ron did.

Harry was still clueless.

"Why such reaction? Both of you must be used by now to all my stunts in the infirmary, nothing new here-"

To Harry horror, Hermione broke out into sobs and lunged at him, grabbing him and clutching him closer, so close it was stifling, and her shoulders trembled in that vibrating fashion that was so hesitant, so insecure that Harry didn't spare a second thought about wrapping his arms around her and cradling her. He was still confused. Still didn't know what he was comforting her for. But the urge was there, and as she opened her mouth to speak, a shudder speared through his heart.

An imaginary voice urged him to seal her mouth shut. He didn't want to hear whatever she was about to say. He had to shut her up. Had to cast _Silencio_. Had to up and go. Had to leave that place.

He stifled that little voice.

The atmosphere around them tightened with the renewed tears and the tears still unshed.

Finally, fumbling with her fingers, Hermione whispered, "Malfoy had another goal to fulfil that night. Professor's d- dea-" She hiccoughed, unable to utter the ominous word. Harry rubbed her hand gently. "-_It _wasn't the only task Voldemort gave him. The other was to dispose of you."

Harry blinked. The weight on his chest evaporated with those words and he burst out laughing.

"Oh, Hermione! You should be used to those failed murder attempts by now. Hey, I'm still alive here, no? Obviously, something has gone wrong. Something other than Malfoy's existence in this world, of course."

Strangely, the air was still heavy with unspoken grief and smelled with woe.

Hermione stilled. Uncertain, Harry grabbed her by the shoulder.

"He succeeded."

"Don't be stupid. I feel great, physically." His mood darkened as tears strangled his throat once more. "It's Professor Dumbledore-"

"Malfoy cast a spell in the hustle," Hermione cut in, sick with dragging it out. She wrangled out of his hold, raising her head to pierce him with her eyes. "It burns your magical core."

"Can't Madame Pomfrey fix it? Plenty of students exhaust their cores, especially the newbies, then she forces a bunch of potions down their throats – and they're good again," Harry retorted. Was Hermione acting stupid? Harry could understand it – the death of the man important in both their lives, and Harry's own severe injury could have temporarily addled any brain. Even Hermione's, obviously.

"_Exhaust_, not burn!" Hermione exclaimed furiously. She clenched her hands into tight fists. "What Malfoy has done is despicable. No one knows what spell _exactly _he used, because there are several that have alike effects, so no one can administer the right cure." She paused. "If it exists at all. Madame Pomfrey says the only possible answer might lie in the ancient magicks, and that would be our best bet..."

Here she hesitated. Harry, pale, with slight tremors running down his spine at the implications, urged her to continue. She complied.

"But they are mostly Dark Arts."

Harry recoiled in shock. When he regained his voice, now laced with disgust and mild horror, he asked hesitantly, "Surely it can't be that bad? So, if the core's burning, the amount of my magic is decreasing... I can live with it. If I have a bit less power, I mean. It should be enough to last me until Voldemort is defeated, and from then on I can leave as a-" It felt difficult to say. Hard to think. "-as a muggle. Or a squib."

Hermione laughed – a broken, dry laugh that didn't resemble her at all, but made Harry flinch. Bitterness, suppressed rage, hurt... The laugh embraced it all.

"Wizards are different from muggles, Harry," she told him gently, for once foregoing to nagging about him not being studious enough. Just as gently, she took his hands in hers.

"You see, in many ways our cores determine our lifespan. The magic in our system generally does. Haven't you wondered why wizards usually live much longer than muggles?" Waiting for him to nod, she continued, "And creatures, whose whole bodies are imbued with magic, even more so. It's all because of magic...

"But just as magic gives a longer life-" Here her voice pitched lower into an ill-omened whisper that thundered in the room despite its softness. "-it can as easily take this time away. When a wizard's core is torn away completely from him, even though his heart is still beating, even though the soul still flutters in his body... He will die."

"You lie!" Harry's yell of accusation rang through the room. Curt, sharp, it wasn't his way, and Hermione didn't deserve the tone- But she was lying, Harry was convinced of it. She had to, because otherwise...

Otherwise, he had to bury all his unfulfilled dreams, had to bid farewell to all those people he was yet to meet as well as to those he had met and loved or hated, had to end his romance with Ginny (oh, Ginny! How she would react?) and forget all about a house for the two of them and a bunch of children. Myriads of hopes and visions for his future sped by and, all one by one, shattered in his mind.

He swallowed and swallowed and swallowed.

The guilt and sorrow intertwined on Hermione's face sharpened his grief and broke his delusions. He wanted to scamper and hide in a safe cocoon of ignorance, but the veil of comfortable lies had been lifted, and now he couldn't glance away from the truth.

Because it was true. Deep in himself, Harry's magic sadly hummed to prove Hermione's words.

"How long?"

The voice was a scratchy sound of death and despair, as ugly as Harry's reality of life suddenly seemed.

Hermione turned away. The sound affected her, too.

"If nothing accelerates the process, about five-six years."

"Enough for Voldemort to die," Harry promised himself in a deadly tone. That made Hermione's attention return to him as she stared at him, wide-eyed.

"You can't!" she exclaimed. Her hold on his hands tightened, as if she wanted to tie him to the bed and leave him there, denying him the satisfaction of his bloodlust. "We must find the cure first, we must preserve the time you have-"

"People are dying out there, Hermione!" Harry shouted, finally losing his composure. It had overwhelmed him. Dumbledore's death, Snape's final betrayal, his own impending death... Nothing but darkness existed in his world now. "I'm a lost case; I have always been if you think about it!"

Those words hurt to say. Hurt to think. But they silenced Hermione nicely.

"You can't mean it-"

"Yes I bloody do! I am fated to fight with him and to win or die trying. No one else can. Dumbledore tried, but look where it left him! He couldn't do it in the end." Breathless from his outburst, Harry softened his tone. "So, it's my turn to try, no? Maybe the results will be the same. Maybe I'll win, and if I do, we can research to find the cure together. After the war. In peace. Would you like that, Hermione?"

She pursed her lips with that stubborn spark in her chocolate-coloured eyes that Harry usually admired but now wanted to curse to hell and back. It told her clearly that she wasn't convinced.

"I will call Ron," she told him instead of replying. As she stood up, wiping the tear tracks and smoothing out her school robe, she continued, somewhat coolly, "He will be delighted to know you've woken up now, but awkward because he thinks he should have listened to you when you accused Malfoy. So, be prepared for his gloomy mood. Madame Pomfrey is catching on some sleep right now, because she exhausted herself browsing her healing magic tomes in search of something to help you, so let's leave her to it for a bit."

She whirled around and strode out of the infirmary, regardless of Harry's cries to wait.

Unbeknownst to him, her brilliant mind was working full blast. Possibilities raced by and were dismissed. Ideas spun and rushed and pinged. Suggestions and plans all tangled together to create outlines of the next possible course of action, where everything, even the most outlandish details like time-travel or forbidden magic, were taken into consideration.

She would not see her best friend die on her all because it was his "fate" or some other utter balderdash.

She would save him. Like she always did.

{ERASING DEATH}

Inside the infirmary, Harry crumbled into a foetal position.

What were five-six years on the scale of life wizards usually led? He would die without ever living, in an endless fight that had begun before his awareness, without ever experiencing the joys of family or freedom.

Hermione had provided little information, and there had been little time to research, but Harry still trusted her word. If she was so sure no cure existed for him...

He needed to hurry.

Harry had never been a child, understanding the notion of responsibility from an early age, so he put defeating Voldemort before his unwanted ailment. After all, if Dumbledore could stare in the face of death with so much calm and even amiability, Harry would step into the man's shoes and sacrifice himself for the loved ones. It hurt, yes, but it would spare the hurt of so many others...

Besides, Dumbledore had given Harry all the tools and all the knowledge needed.

Horcruxes. Well, destroying a few objects surely couldn't be that hard, right?

The door creaked open, the sound breaking through Harry's intense ponderings. He schooled his features into a small smile when he met Ron's eyes, and prepared himself to console his friend and to relay his Grand Plan, which he had been to stunned to do with Hermione. Probably, they would at least point him to the right direction as to what the artefacts Voldemort had put his soul in were.

Harry didn't have the time to be afraid of dying when he had an entire world to fix.

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Notes: 'tis only a prologue, but the next chappie's going to be bigger.


	2. Protection and Friends

Thanx to all of my readers, esp to those who reviewed!

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Chapter 2. Protection and Friends

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The hours of mourning Harry spent in a daze. Initially he even imagined his eyeglasses to be malfunctioning – for how else could you explain the blurry forms and traces of intangible mist in place of the usual relative sharpness?

But then Harry remembered Sirius, remembered going through a similar phase once, and drowned his silly question in a sea of practiced nonchalance that didn't conceal his real grief from the sharp eyes of his friends, who watched his every move. On their faces sympathy warred with pity. Harry always turned away at the sight.

He had let in on the secret of his impending death very few people, the bare minimum: Madame Pomfrey, obviously, Hermione, Ron.

Those were the ones who mattered most, the closest ones. He couldn't lie to them. In the time of crumbling worlds, they were Harry's unique pillar of support, and the mere idea of tearing that one solace away from his dying hands brought up panic to Harry's chest.

He squashed those pitiful thoughts. They resurfaced time after time.

The overprotectiveness of Ron and Hermione both bothered and warmed Harry. Their insistence that he took precedence before the Horcrux-hunt annoyed him, for how could they not see that the defeat of Voldemort won over the life of a single person? That by caring for him they were taking away the precious time they could spend researching powerful battle spells and tactics, inventing means to protect their friends and family and Hogwarts, scheming up ways to get to Voldemort's horcruxes?

But no, both Ron and Hermione took the exasperating I-am-your-best-friend-you're-more-important-to-me- than-an-old-locket route.

Hermione holed herself up in the library – not that she wouldn't in any other case – and flipped through the pages of ancient tomes till the wee hours of morning in search of some sort of a cure for Harry. He attempted to drag her to the section where they were likely to find horcrux-books. It didn't end well for him. His ear drums still hurt. Harry didn't enjoy shouting matches about the importance of his life in the whole ordeal.

Ron, on the other hand, followed Harry like an eager puppy. A very annoyed eager puppy. He glared and snapped at everyone who dared shove Harry, or lightly punch his shoulder in greeting, or even tap him with a finger!

Harry bristled. He wasn't a delicate china teacup, for Merlin's sake! He wouldn't shatter. He wouldn't allow himself to.

Most of the DA picked up on something and also treated Harry like they would a bloody princess or a pureblood.

Ginny didn't even kick up a storm when he solemnly delivered the news of their imminent breakup. She attempted to battle his decision with logic, sulked and glowered, but didn't slap or punch him like Harry got a feeling she wanted to do. He supposed Ron's glaring presence just behind him had something to do with that.

Neville's smiles strained around the edges, and Harry suspected it was not only because of Dumbledore's passing. He refused to allow Harry to comfort him either. It left the green-eyed boy feeling more isolated and lonely as ever – Ron retained some of his spark still, but something in Neville's gentler presence always reassured Harry, too.

Most of the others grieved for the Headmaster, just like Harry, but sometimes they would come to him and clap him on the shoulder or try to cheer him up, which had rarely happened before. Harry guessed Ron had slipped and implied that Harry was very down or perhaps even shattered, for whatever reason, and the others attempted to brighten his day even through their own suffering.

He appreciated it. Really, he did. Initially, he had smiled and thanked them, but then it all escalated in a ridiculous way – and the whole made-of-glass treatment thing ceased to flatter him quickly.

Harry's only respite among all that protectiveness lay with Luna. She probably knew about his sensitive condition but didn't give a damn about it, treating him like she had always done – blabbering all about nargle-hunts, shoving a Quibbler in his face, spouting nonsense and cheering him up with an occasional wise thought. Not as oppressive as Harry's best friends, she drew his affection those days.

Harry actually contemplated cracking up and revealing her the truth about horcruxes. If his friends contented themselves with mollycoddling him instead of brainstorming ways to find Voldemort's anchors to immortality, Harry could as well toss them aside and carry on his plans with a minimum of help: Luna and her dubious knowledge of the Founders and the magical world.

Except that he didn't want to involve anyone at all.

The less people knew – the bigger their chance to escape Voldemort or not rush into an unknown danger of searching for Merlin-knew-what in Merlin-knew-where Merlin-knew-how.

Harry wished to spare Luna that bit of potential risk.

Later, after the re-opened wound of Dumbledore-s funeral, Harry found out he shouldn't have bothered. Luna always had a knack of hitting upon dangerous ideas all on her own.

Maybe that was why he liked her.

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Harry had mourned and grieved for both himself and the late headmaster so much that his trails of tears had long run dry. Just like those of the people around him. When they buried the wizened body that held no trace of anger or betrayal or hurt, just acceptance, Harry didn't know whom he pitied more, who of the two of them had lost more: his old professor, who had lived and experienced life in all its colours and apparently hadn't regretted one thing, or himself, a boy lost in a world of fighting with no hope ahead of him now.

With the news of his imminent death, Harry felt as if some part of him had died already, before the decease had even begun its course.

With empty eyes, Harry watched.

When Lavender burst out crying, stifling her sobs into Parvati's shoulder, and Neville rubbed his eyes but stayed strong with eyes dry, and Ginny concealed her face with both her hands in an attempt to hide her silent weeping, as if her shaking shoulders didn't give her away already, a thought struck Harry.

If Voldemort didn't kill him, in a few years Harry would be where Dumbledore now was.

Would they grieve him like that, too?

Would they care?

Would they weep and scream and lament?

Harry balled his fists. Suddenly, he couldn't watch those black-clad people anymore.

He needed to get away. Fast.

Everyone, even Ron and Hermione, held a single figure in their sight, so Harry slipped away with no trouble at all.

He wandered off to an oak near the Black Lake. He didn't come there alone often, more used to visiting the place with Hermione and Ron for company, but now the solitude soothed him. Wallowing in self-pity, he didn't notice the shadow that fell across the grass in front of him, and jerked when a pale, almost translucent hand lightly poked him on the shoulder.

Harry's eyes darted up.

"Luna!" he breathed out in relief. "What are you doing here now? Shouldn't you be at- at the ceremony, with the others?"

Luna didn't reply. Instead, she dropped on the grass and crossed her legs Indian-style, watching him with a pensive frown that Harry recognised for her deep-in-thought expression.

"There are more wrackspurts that usual clogging your ears today," she finally said in a mild tone. She didn't accuse him, merely stated the fact. Perhaps that put Harry at ease somewhat.

A strained smile flashed across his face.

"Your necklace isn't working as it should. It's no wonder they are here."

"Of course it doesn't. You never put it on." Surprise at his lack of comprehension coloured her tone. Harry's grin grew a tad more genuine. "If you don't like necklaces, I can give you a dress. A dress might cheer you up." She scrunched up her forehead in thought. "At least, so some girls think."

Harry shook his head in exasperation, carefully hiding his grimace. He didn't want to offend Luna, but sometimes her ideas were... a nit over the top. Just a twinge, really.

He was _so_ refusing this one.

"I am a male, Luna," he reprimanded her with a slight warning. "I don't wear dresses."

"I didn't say anything about wearing it. Just trying it on will do." Luna shrugged her shoulders. At Harry's quiet snort, she added, "And look, the mention of dresses has killed a wrackspurt already. They can be a deadly weapon." She nodded repeatedly with a wise expression to prove her point.

"_You_ can be a deadly weapon, Luna," Harry laughed out. "Did the snorckacks lead you here?"

"Not really," she denied calmly. "I came because my feet carried me to this old oak where you had wrackspurts attack you."

Harry sighed and drew his knees to his chest, while his fingers fumbled with the grass, sometimes tearing the green strands out of the ground.

"You know that nothing is going to be the same now?" Harry asked her in a hollow voice. "After his- after the incident everything will change. People. Lifestyle. Hogwarts. Ministries and higher-ups. Everyone will question the Ministry's capability of protecting them, and of course you know how the Ministry's protection goes – the place is filled with a bunch of parasitic bumbling idiots!"

Harry's initially soft voice grew in volume until it reached the plank of shouting.

Daily and nightly, the war weighted on his mind.

Luna raised her hand to tread through his black tresses, but didn't interrupt his harangue.

"And Ron and Hermione are to occupied with-" He faltered. "With other things, and don't care that much about the war anymore, and it's become such a mess-"

"They care about _you_."

That shut Harry up. He sighed and batted Luna's hand away, messing up his hair himself in irritation.

"I know," he ground out at last. "I appreciate it, really, I do."

He closed his eyes, loudly exhaling. Confiding his thoughts troubled him a lot, maybe because he didn't practise it often, never with anyone outside of their small circle of three: him, Ron, and Hermione.

"I worry about all those people who depend on the Ministry that has nearly fallen and can't protect themselves without any outside help. I can't tell you much, but Dumbledore left a Task to the three of us, and we are those people's last and only hope. They simply won't survive if we don't carry it out!" Harry cried out in agitation, staring in Luna's eyes imploringly, beseeching her to understand.

It was important that someone realised how important the Task was, that horcruxes must be destroyed before everything else, that he couldn't be selfish but prop up the heavy mantle of Dumbledore's successor and rid the world of the Dark Lord.

Because, if no one assured him, Harry might just take the easy way out.

Hermione had offered him a way the night before. For all the three of them. It was outlandish, dangerous, impossible, ridiculous... and utterly promising, both for Harry and for the whole of the Wizarding World.

He longed to explore the possibility, to speak about it in depth...

But the fright of falling in love with the idea took over.

"Hmm..." Meanwhile, Luna traced invisible circles in the air with her finger. "Sounds awfully conceited of you, Harry."

"What?" Harry blinked. Of all the things she could say, that one never made it to the list.

"You are speaking how the existence of the world and of its people depends on you, how everyone and everything would die out if you fail..." Now it was her turn to blink. "The wrackspurts put even more ideas in your head than I imagined. Even the Ferret is not as pretentious as you are acting now."

"The Ferret-" Harry's face and mood darkened as he spat out, "Don't mention that bastard to me! I'll kill him next time we see each other."

Pure, undulated rage overtook him and Harry drowned his desire to kill things and toss around spells. Malfoy's fault, all of it! Because of that scheming nuisance Harry's clock was ticking his life away and he himself was torn between the shackles of duty and the pull of his own wishes.

At the moment, even Harry's hatred of Snape quivered before the one he granted Malfoy.

Luna smiled in understanding, her smile reeking of promises.

"I will sic nargles on him in your absence," she assured him lightly. Harry's eyes sharpened.

"'In my absence'? What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you will be absent. You are not going to return to Hogwarts next year, right?" Harry froze, while she nodded thoughtfully to herself. "Yes, you have two main choices before you right now, but returning to Hogwarts is a third and it doesn't count. No matter what you decide, we'll miss your presence in the castle."

Stunned, Harry gawked at her.

"I never told anyone about either of the possibilities," he let out in a strangled voice. "How-"

Luna's gaze abruptly sharpened, just at the same time as Harry noticed Ron frantically looking for him across the lake.

The two didn't have much time alone anymore.

The girl rummaged through the numerous pockets of her dress – surprisingly black, considering she was, well, Luna – before fishing out a small pendant in the form of a few twigs held together by what seemed to be a lock of blonde hair. The blonde shoved it into his hands in a hurried fashion, springing to her feet.

Ron was nearing them with a furious expression on his face.

"It was supposed to go to my mother," Luna confided. Once again her hand dove into another pocket, and this time she dug out a piece of strange, rough parchment. It quickly ended up in Harry's clutch. "But she met my father before she had had the chance to use it. Or maybe she knew, like I do now."

She paused and her eyes glittered as she added, "And, Harry, I want you to consider that why would you want to improve the world when you are not around to see the fruit of your labour? It's all the wrackspurts. They make you lose every scrap of common sense."

Her dreamy smiled returned as she scurried away without looking hasty at all.

Without a single word of explanation, of course.

Harry sighed. Typical Luna. Dumping a load of hazy bits of information on him and not even sticking around to see his reaction.

"Harry!" Ron huffed out as he finally reached him. Harry winced; his escape had obviously worried and troubled his friend, to the point where the redhead had probably freaked out and been running around Hogwarts and its grounds in search of him.

"Sorry," Harry muttered sheepishly, covertly sneaking the items Luna had handed to him into his pocket. "Needed to get away from it all for a second. Where is Hermione?"

Ron shook his head with a scowl. "Honestly, mate. It's no fun searching all 'round the place for you. And Hermione's in the library, of course!" He nervously glanced around to check if anyone was listening to them before leaning in to whisper in Harry's ear, "She told me she found something on Arhianrod Academy."

Harry's heartbeat quickened.

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The entire ride back to Hogwarts the trio spent cooped up in a locked compartment without allowing anyone in.

They were making plans to transfer.

At first, Harry had refused, appalled at the very idea of abandoning the war. However temporarily, for hazy possibilities, but Hermione and Ron vehemently refused setting off on a horcrux-hunt until they found a cure for him, and both provided legit reasons as to why they would be highly unsafe at Hogwarts even without him there.

Right now Harry was reassuring himself by hearing out the reasoning again.

"Everyone knows Ron here is your best friend," Hermione not-so-patiently repeated for the umpteenth time. Harry nodded. "And I'm a muggleborn. I can't be safe in a Death Eater-y environment by default."

"Yes, but- Who knows how unsafe this new school is going to be? The books mention the high mortality rate, no?"

"Hey, mate, when the alternative's to spend a year chumming up to overgrown torture machines, you appreciate whatever other choices you have," Ron protested, munching a chocolate frog. He had made up his mind, Harry realised numbly.

Harry sighed and rubbed his temples. Sometimes he wished stubbornness didn't exist. He merrily ignored the nagging thought that his own bloody-mindedness and clinging to the war duty represented the same thing.

"It mentions that we will be studying Dark Arts there," Harry breached the nitty gritty of the matter. Carefully, he gauged the reactions of both of his friends. They paled but otherwise remained certain in their decision. "I- I can't sacrifice your purity like this. True, going to Arianrhod might kill two birds with one stone, as we can find a cure for me and a way to destroy Voldemort there, but we'll be constantly interacting with dangerous creatures – and I mean worse than Hagrid-dangerous, even! – and we will have to learn revolting magicks. Are you ready?"

Harry himself was.

He had pondered on the matter, and while he would prefer to go the secure trope provided by Dumbledore, the idea of new sorts of magic thrilled him, not least because it gave him hope to actually live and see the result of his questionable heroics.

When the conventional stops working, you resort to the unconventional, right?

Harry, while not as bookish and studious as Hermione, had always enjoyed magic. Mostly the practical aspect of it, of course, but sometimes particular details fascinated him, too: although Patronus had been a necessity, it didn't change the appeal it had for Harry. He just didn't like long-winded explanations of how a spell worked, preferring instead to rise from his arse, gather his magic and raise his wand, and actually _make it_ _work_.

"I don't want to learn any-" Ron grimaced, as if he had eaten a barrage of rotting lemons. "-any Dark Arts unless it's necessary. But, y'know, hard times? I'd be casting them as little as possible, but I'd like to research ways to get stronger with other means."

Hermione nodded, too, and Harry read certainty and determination swimming in her eyes. He mentally gave in.

Almost. One final attempt.

"They demand perfect marks there," he brought up feebly, knowing the battle was lost, but remaining pig-headed through it. "Hermione, you, of course, can boast of that, but my marks in most subjects are as good as Neville is in potions. Not exactly straight O's material."

"I've thought about it." Hermione's lips stretched in a smug smirk. She dug into her bag. "And the first thing I did as soon as I got the vibe that you might just agree to all this madness was contact the headmaster, of course! Ta-da!"

At Harry's disbelieving stare she threw her hand with a letter tightly clutched in it up in the air.

Ron whistled. "That's fast, Hermione!"

Harry glared at them, accusing. "You knew! And neither of you thought to tell me!"

Hermione shrugged a guilty shoulder before her brown eyes sparkled. Harry almost grit his teeth but refrained at the last moment. The secrecy of his best friends overwhelmed him sometimes. Every time they turned it against him, actually.

"I didn't want to push you-"

"As if I'd believe it," Harry muttered. Hermione ignored him.

"-so I delayed telling you about the reply."

"Didn't want to freak you out, mate," Ron piped in helpfully while nearly finishing off another chocolate frog, the last in the box. With a nervously sheepish expression, he offered the card to Harry, but withdrew his hand at the skewering glower he received in reply. "Right," he mumbled dejectedly.

"I can't believe how careless you are," Harry hissed at Hermione. "Owl post can easily be intercepted, especially right now. If you truly believe-"

"Not the post to Arianrhod," Hermione interrupted smugly, pointedly. She waved the letter in front of Harry's nose, as if to say, 'See here? It got there all right, they even replied us!'

Harry snorted sceptically. "Yeah. Of course. This school is obviously so fabulous and super-powerful and has so much authority that even Voldemort has the courtesy to refrain from checking any letters that go there. Even when he sees they're from me or you two."

"It's kinda true?" Ron offered from the sidelines, for once enjoying that the amount of information he possessed was superior to Harry's. The black-haired boy refrained from smacking that annoying grin off the redhead's face with a well-placed hex.

"Explain."

Hermione nibbled on her bottom lip.

"How do I put it... Well, actually, he can still open any letters that come to Arianrhod if they are directed to a student or a professor. On the other hand, when you address the headmaster, you have to cast a spell mentioned in the books, which activates some a charm that in turn activates a special protection. This protection doesn't allow anyone but the headmaster and his or her deputy to read or even open it. The reply is protected in the same way – no one but the addressee can see what is inside."

Harry leaned back in his seat, impressed. He didn't know much about complicated stuff like magical theory and such, but that sounded like an impressive feat of magic. He could see Hermione appreciated it, too: her eyes gleamed like they rarely did since the news of his impending... demise.

Harry's friends nervously observed his reaction. It irritated him. When they tiptoed around him and his moods, the latter got only worse because subconsciously such reaction knocked down his self-assurance, making him think himself untrustworthy and as viable to burst as a volcano – except that in some cases a volcano would seem a lovely paradise holiday with a bit of hot in comparison to Harry's _mood_.

"We are certainly going to learn it when we go there," Harry remarked calmly. His lips twitched in amusement at their disbelief when he failed to react angrily like they had expected. "So, what about the reply? Wait, did you contact the deputy or the headmaster?"

"I was just getting there," Hermione replied in exasperation. She took the letter out – beige paper, black ink, expensive – and carefully unfolded it. Harry noticed the worn edges – she must have re-read it a lot then. Probably checking for hidden meanings or seeking reassurance that the sender was telling the truth. Whatever that truth was.

"So, Deputy Headmaster Hilarius Tristis assures us that Human World OWL results don't matter as long as the student keeps up with the curriculum of Creature World. We'll have to take exams to get into the appropriate year, of course, but..."

Harry grinned.

"Splendid!"

And so they began concocting their escape plan.

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The horrid summer passed, although this time Harry found it less unbearable. Hermione had snuck in some books so he could prepare for the entrance exams, and also had given him the portkey to Arianrhod that would activate any time during summer with the password.

So, Harry studied.

He brushed up on his Potions knowledge. At first, Harry was unable to make heads or tails of the subject, but with a great amount of determination and Hermione's handy notes, without Snape sneering down at him, Harry found himself to be a decent brewer.

He breezed through his Charms and DADA textbooks, scraped through all the other subjects Hermione insisted on his revising. Deputy's letter had also offered three lists of the subjects they were allowed to take each. Some choices in the selection horrified them. They had chosen the more innocent-sounding ones, Hermione's list impressing Harry and Ron, even though they should have expected that on some level.

Harry had selected Healing (who wouldn't want to help a fallen comrade?), Parselmagic (just swell to use Voldemort's tricks against him), Battle Spells (which included protective shields and techniques, too. The list didn't include DADA), Advanced Charms, Physical Training, Occlumency (he hoped the teacher was _good_). Hermione had forced him to take Potions, too, to see if he would improve without Snape's imposing glare.

Harry shared Battle Spells and Physical Training with Ron, but not with Hermione, who insisted she considered those too manly even for her. Harry agreed. His best friend had no place on battlefield.

Ron's eyes had lit up at the sound of Blacksmithing, because that's where his brothers wouldn't shine for sure. He had also chosen Magical Creatures and Transfiguration, just so he wouldn't seem like a lazy idiot in comparison to his two friends.

Hermione's range of subjects included Arithmancy, Transfiguration, Alchemy (which sounded _neat_. But not for Harry's brains), Magical Theory, Warding, Spell Creation. She shared Advanced Potions and Advanced Charms with Harry. She had also decided to be the most responsible, knowledgeable and respectful person by taking up Creature World Culture.

Arianrhod gave all of them a purpose, even shoving aside Harry's moping and sulks about the death that awaited him.

The start of Harry's summer didn't prepare him at all for its tragic proceedings – Moody'd death and George's injury.

Every drop of death or hurt fell like salt on torn wounds.

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When the guests of Bill and Fleur's wedding panicked and flailed around the place, Harry, Ron, and Hermione traded a look.

Time had come.

Filtering out of the tent and apparating away, they took out the portkey that led to Arianrhod, clasped their hands around it, and allowed the object to carry them away, into the unknown.

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I didn't kid you when I told you that I don't want any bashing involved. Ron and 'Mione are goin' with Harry! Don't believe I've ever seen any stories with Ron tagging along, btw. It's always Hermione at most.

Also, a question: do you want tah have Voldemort somewhat redeemed sometime? No, I don't mean a hugs 'n' kisses reunion and Harry forgivin' the bloke for all his misgivings, and Voldy'd have tah work for it, and if it comes, it probably won't come until very late into the fic... But yeah, the question hangs there somewhere. I'm in ho hurry to receive the reply ;D

Read and Review, please!


	3. The Arrival and Arianrhod

_Thanx for your reviews!_

_Btw, just 'cause Harry arrives with Ron and Hermione doesn't mean that the story'll focus on them that much; he's still the main character, so..._

* * *

Chapter 3. The Arrival and Arianrhod

* * *

Harry hated portkeys. He staggered to the floor, of course, while Ron and Hermione remained mostly on their feet. Damn. It was always him.

"Looks... nice," Hermione muttered uncertainly.

Harry raised his head to observe the place they had appeared in.

They were standing in a vast hall, in the middle of a circle engraved with runes and some symbols Harry had no idea existed. The walls were painted with images of epic battles and fantastical creatures that took his breath away. The ceiling seemed unreachable: high up and hidden by a veil of mist. No windows. A single door.

"Glad you approve," a voice, like clacking of stones, said behind them. The three friends spun around to face the potential threat.

The man who met them with an impassive stare and a cocked head possessed a slightly crooked nose that reminded Harry of Dumbledore, a strong jawline and piercing black eyes partly shielded by a long black fringe, dark brown hair arranged in a feathery haircut. Harry found him fairly handsome despite the expression of eternal melancholy painted on his face.

It helped that behind the man a pair of luxuriously beautiful black wings spread, all feathers and volume.

"Are you... Professor Hilarius Tristis?" Harry stepped forward to ask uncertainly. His eyes flickered to the wings before, bravely, he raised his head to meet those blackest eyes. Harry imagined a nanosecond-long grin to lift the man's lips.

"Yes."

Ron shuffled his feet anxiously and Hermione opened her mouth to ask a question, but Tristis held out his hand to stop the words in her mouth.

"Not here. You expressed a wish to keep it all under wraps in your letter."

They all nodded in reply. Harry didn't take his eyes off the man.

"Then this is not the best place for a talk. Come," he ordered sharply. Without beckoning them to follow, simply expecting it of them, he swivelled and stalked off to the door. Harry shook off the stupor first, catching up quickly.

"Where are we going?" he asked eagerly. Professor Tristis didn't look like a ray of sunshine, but Harry saw no harm in quenching his curiosity. Books hardly specified the inlay of Arianrhod, or its hierarchy, or its web of corridors and hallways. Even Deputy's letters didn't mention much of the inside info about the school or the realm, Creature World, which Harry treated like Wizarding World come again.

Even his brooding about his impending death subsided in the wake of renewed excitement.

From the corner of his eye, he glimpsed Ron and Hermione looking around with wonder, too.

"To the Headmistress."

Harry understood that, despite the politely reserved letters filled with pieces of information, Tristis wasn't one for talking.

The teen accepted the curt reply and fell behind a bit, letting Ron and Hermione catch up. They shared their anticipation and fear in silence, listening as their footfalls echoed through the halls, following the man's.

Change after change – so ran the course of Harry's life lately. A whirlwind of deaths, hurts, betrayals, alterations... Harry hoped that the life he would find in Arianrhod gave him one last moment of respite from those tragedies, so that on his deathbed he would honestly say his life had been fulfilling.

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When Tristis pushed open the office door, Harry deeply inhaled. For a second, his hand found his friends': somehow, after the news of his doom, he found himself enjoying touch more, as if it gave him reassurances his own mind and soul couldn't muster up.

"He could be a little more courteous," Hermione murmured in his ear with disapproval as she commented on Tristis entering the Headmistress's office without any invitation or even a backward glance.

"A bad day?" Harry shrugged; honestly, he cared little about the man's moods. All that mattered was the events unfolding in front of his eyes, and he still questioned whether it had been a complete insanity to come there without any knowledge of customs and traditions of the school and the realm, without any real plan other than cooping themselves up in the library, without any idea what they ought and ought not do.

All in all, Harry trusted his lack to carry them through the day. Hare-brained idea? Perhaps, but also one that worked for him, in past and present.

The door remained dauntingly open.

Arming himself with valour, Harry strode in, tugging Hermione behind him. Ron tagged along; his feet shuffled on the stone floor that wasn't covered with any sort of carpets.

"Welcome to Arianrhod Academy," an ageless voice said calmly. The trio stared at the woman who smiled at them gently, the expression crinkling her face already ridden with laughter lines. Elderly but sophisticated, she sat regally enthroned behind her desk, dressed spick and span in tasteful dark purple robes, with her greying hair pulled into a neat low ponytail. Professor Tristis calmly stood at her right side. He reminded Harry of a magical statue that would move with one word of order from its conjurer.

As always, it befell Harry to take the first step and to be the bravest of the three, so he spoke before his friends gathered their wits.

"Uh- Hello, we're happy you have allowed us to come here." Uncertain, Harry bowed slightly and hastily. Was he supposed to shake her head? To introduce himself immediately? To compliment the school, or her dress, or the furniture?

Luckily, the woman didn't take offense at his ignorance. She chuckled. Tristis's pressed lips stretched a bit, too.

"As the Headmistress, I cannot reject those in need," she remarked simply, looking at each of them in turn. Her gaze lingered the longest on Harry, but she paid a fair bit of attention to Hermione, too, and almost completely bypassed Ron. "You called for help, and it was my duty to provide it. It is enough that you repay by being proper students and upholding the honour of this school."

"And pay the tuition fees, of course," Tristis added curtly. Ron scoffed, while the woman threw him a reproachful glance.

"We've taken care of it already," Hermione piped in immediately. She fumbled with words before asking, "Um... What is your name? I'm afraid it wasn't listed in any book, and Professor Tristis didn't specify it in any of his replies to us, so we had no means to find out, and I'm terribly sorry-"

"Lavarcam Silverain," the woman interrupted the speech Hermione was on the verge of breaking into. She leaned in to steeple her fingers and rest her chin on them. "You may call me Headmistress or Professor Silverain. I teach the Magic of Time course, but none of you takes it."

Rosy blush tinged Hermione's cheeks and she muttered something like 'too many subjects', and Harry decided to ask a question that had bugged him when they had been choosing their subjects.

"The list..." he started, looking Silverain in the eye. "It mentioned bloodline subjects... What-"

"Subjects which belong to a certain race and cannot be learnt by any outsider," Tristis, surprisingly, answered. His dark eyes glimmered, which discomfited Harry. "The thrall of a veela, the time manipulation by a time demon, the blood magic of vampires..." He paused. The gleam intensified in its power. "There are only a few exceptions to this rule... Of which you make part, Mr. Potter."

Harry blinked and tilted his head to a side. The news surprised him. He didn't consider himself special. In fact, he violently hated moments when people insisted on worshipping him or his abilities or his achievements, and shied away from the attention he might receive due to that, so to be viewed as an oddity again...

The possibility suffocated him. Harry wanted to be normal. At least in Arianrhod, amongst the weird and the abnormal, he willed normalcy to descend upon him, so that everyone treated him like a human being, not some Merlin incarnate or a tool to solve their problems.

Harry decided to take the chance and weasel out of the dreadful prospect. No better way than to feign ignorance.

"What are you talking about?" This time blinking was intentional. The question rang partly true, because Harry didn't _know_ yet, but after some extensive additional reading on creatures, a suspicion crept up on him. "I can't enchant people like a veela, nor can I transform into a beast during full moons. Nothing special, see? I'm just Harry-"

"Speaking to snakes?" The deadpan question rang coldly through the room. Harry didn't like the man much anymore. His shoulders tensed.

"This is not a talent I'm proud of."

"It is your talent no less. Part of you, of your magical legacy, even if the way it carried over to you wasn't natural or right." Tristis's voice possessed a breathless wonder when he spoke of Harry's talent, which made the wizard knit his eyebrows together. The man was watching him hungrily, digging into Harry's very core – but also through him, as if he were seeing with a different set of eyes and seeing more than he should have.

As if whatever he saw in Harry puzzled him-

But Harry was completely ordinary. Completely ordinary and half-dead already, his mind whispered bitterly, but he ignored it. He ignored most those thoughts, preferring to focus on his goals, both long-term and short-term. They eased his existence.

Tristis noticed Harry's discomfort. Unexpectedly, his lips curled into a semi-smile.

"I can do a full reading of your soul. Believe me, you will find the results most enlightening." An indecipherable emotion sparked in the depths of his irises. "But you will have to pay me plenty for that. Readings are a costly thing, especially for one such as you."

Black eyes, darker than Snape's, bore into Harry's. He immediately felt trapped, caught up in the swirling tunnels of shadows. The man even smelt like that, too: dark corners and old graveyards covered by the veil of nightfall.

At Harry's side, Ron bristled. "Hey! What are you proposing him-"

"Hilarius," Silverain chided the man. The deputy inclined his head to show he was listening. Harry immediately felt relieved at the loss of eye contact. "I would appreciate it if you kept your deals out of my office."

"On the contrary, your office is the best place to conduct business meetings and forge deals," Tristis disagreed. "No foreign magic interfering, no trickery, no falsehoods."

Harry wondered what deals they were talking about, but hesitant to interfere. Luckily, the Headmistress returned to the matters at hand herself, without further prompting from him or Ron or Hermione.

"Hilarius won't bother you again with his offer-"

"But just so you know, my class would appreciate a lab rat to try soul reading on," Tristis interrupted calmly. His face not moving a muscle, he threw his hood on, which covered his features almost completely, leaving only his chin and his mouth visible. "We are _terribly_ short on those. Of course, this offer is for you two." He nodded at the offended Ron and Hermione. "For Mr. Potter I have a special proposition, not least because I believe you will benefit greatly from knowing what your soul is and how to drive certain- ah, foreign particles out of it."

Without a single word of parting after, he glided out of the office. The man's black cloak and overwhelming aura of corpses and death reminded Harry too much of Dementors to be comfortable. He would surely avoid the man in the future.

Silverain sighed, smiled, and shook her head.

"That man never changes..." he muttered under her breath before her gaze sharpened and she addressed them. "He is the Necromancy professor who sometimes substitutes for Soul Magic."

Ron's face twisted into a disgusted grimace as his body shivered.

"_Necromancy_. It figures the creep would be a dead-raising monster," he spat. Hermione looked shaken, and even Harry couldn't contain a shiver.

Necromancy was a taboo. Of a serious sort, the one you didn't trespass, never dared break. Voldemort dabbled in Necromancy, too, which constituted another reason Harry wanted to keep as far away from the practitioners as possible. The encounter with inferi had also left a mark.

"He is a professor." For the first time the Headmistress's voice dropped to cold pits. "You need not like him, but I will not stand for disrespect. Things here differ from Human World. You might find yourself in a bind if you stick to the stiff-necked moral code of your native realm."

"We know this," Hermione played the mediator. Her brown eyes shifted a bit, but she sounded certain in her words. "We just... didn't expect to face those differences so quickly."

Silverain's countenance mellowed. "Understandable. Still, I believe that you might heed Hilarius's words and check your soul, Mr. Potter. He might not be the most pleasant demon around, but he never tells lies. Although his prices are always high."

Harry nodded, lying, "I'll seek him out someday."

A gentle smile graced Silverain's elderly face. "Good. Now, you expressed a desire to attend under pseudonyms."

"Yes," Hermione agreed, licking her lips. The trio traded looks. "You are aware of our difficult situation in the human world, right?"

"You are hunted."

"Exactly. Though there is little contact between the realms, we cannot afford even for the sliver of the truth about our real identities to come out. In the letters, Professor Tristis told us that pseudonyms make part of normalcy here, so-"

"It is true. Many of the students here are heirs to prominent families who cannot afford having their child assassinated while he hasn't finished his schooling."

Harry was stumped by the blasé way in which she said it. Cold reality hit him. It was the norm to her. Killed students wasn't news here, and they would have to work their arses off to even scratch the surface of 'powerful and respected' here.

Amazingly, the prospect excited Harry.

"Of course, you have to take care of your disguise yourself."

The three traded looks. Harry cleared his throat first.

"Well, this one isn't a problem. We are going to use only minimal correction of our looks, and the rest will be covered by the Liquid Deception potion."

They had discussed the subject of their disguise with vigour. None of them wanted to change their looks too much, not only out of vanity (because, to Harry, his appearance held nothing beautiful in it), but because too many glamours were taxing to keep up and hard to use long-term, especially if they were to be constantly surrounded by people. They would slip up someday, any one of them, and if somebody recognised one, suspicion would fall on all three.

So, after hours of brainstorming, Hermione came up with a solution.

The Liquid Deception.

It was a Dark potion – one of the sacrifices which slaughtered their magical purity, but were utterly necessary. At first they hesitated, and searched for another solution, and refused to do it... But life left them no other choice.

And so the entire batch had been brewed.

The potion had remarkable effect. It didn't morph the features of the person ingesting it, didn't smudge them in the eyes of the beholder, but twisted the recognition in the other person's mind. If Harry drank it, everyone would still know from newspapers that Harry Potter existed, but if that very same person were to see him, they simply wouldn't match the image of Harry Potter from the photographs with him, even when the appearance matched completely. If Harry revealed his identity, than that person would become immune to the Liquid Deception used on Harry and would see through the artificial veneer of magic.

Handy, but very complicated to brew and must be kept secret. As soon as a person found out that their brains were muddled by magic, the effects lifted and the deception vanished. So, seeing that it must be ingested every week, Harry had to be extra careful about where he kept it.

They just tweaked their basic features, too, just in case.

Hermione provided Harry with muggle contact lenses to replace his thick-rimmed glasses, so now his gorgeous green eyes were in full view. He had also done some shopping at his best friend's insistence, so clothes that actually fit hugged his form now. And he drank a potion to lengthen his hair a bit – so it fell just past his shoulders now.

Ron, on the other hand, cropped his hair short, which allowed for a more brutal-macho look, and splurged on a potion that erased all his freckles. The bloke had moped for a day then.

And Hermione straightened her hair completely and took to wear light lipstick – which was as far as her allowance for make-up went. Well, maybe she used something else, too, but Harry didn't know much about those magic bottles labelled 'cosmetics', so he left it at that.

They sorted out their names, too.

"Hermione and I will be cousins," Harry informed the Headmistress, who nodded at him in encouragement. "Hadrian and Hermia Laurifer. Although those names aren't the most inventive, this way we won't make a mistake or ignore people who call us. And Ron-"

"Ronald Prewett," Ron interrupted with a shrug. "There used to be more Prewetts than Weasleys, I hear that even here they've seeped through. And 'Ron' is a common name, like Harry's, except that Harry's got to disguise himself a tad more, no? And Death Eaters don't really care about me 'cause I'm still a pureblood, so they won't torture me on sight or something."

Harry seriously doubted about the latter, but allowed Ron the delusion.

Silverain smiled. "Of course. Now that you have sorted out your issues, I believe we should start on your exams?"

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Harry felt fantastic, energised, and as if the world was at his fingertips. He almost danced through the halls, because he had _passed_. And on his own merits, without Hermione's convenient notes or whispers or tips. Pride didn't often resurfaced in him, but now he honestly could say he was proud of his job, of all the summer hours he had spent revising and learning.

Even Ron managed to scrape through the exams. Without Hermione's stellar results, mind, but still good enough.

So, Harry couldn't wait to get to his dorm room and start un-packing.

Unfortunately, the trio's ways separated there. Hermione, obviously, attained a room in a whole different wing, while Ron's was on the upper floor. Arianrhod was a maze of staircases and winding hallways and classroom, but after living in Hogwarts Harry was well-acquainted with navigation in unknown territories. The map Silverain had given him helped.

The dorms in Arianrhod differed a bit from the familiar Gryffindor ones. They gave Harry more space, but at the same time more duties to do, too: while the school welcomed students to share their meals in the common dining hall, no house elves conveniently did the laundry and the chores. Harry had to make his bed, dust his things, keep everything neat, and the like. He could even cook if he wanted. Not that he wanted to.

The structure alternated from the Hogwarts' dorms too.

Students weren't stuffed in the same room, but rather lived in blocks of a sort. Five rooms for five people came with the shared corridor, kitchen, bathroom, and a small living-room. Somewhat of a flat, all in all.

Harry halted in front of the room, the copper plaque on which read '420'. His dorm.

Bravely, he pushed the door open.

Immediately, a yellow-coloured hex greeted him. Harry ducked, thanking his practice in dodging Petunia's flying crockery, and slammed the door shut. He stood outside for a moment, dumbly staring at the door. Well. Not how he had imagined himself getting acquainted with his... dorm mates? Fellow students?

Resolution filled his heart when Harry opened the door again. His eyes met with startled turquoise. They both blinked at each other, before Harry gained the courage to open the door fully and extend his hand to a strange boy with short dark blue hair and shimmering wings fluttering softly behind his back. Small and with sharp edges, they reminded Harry of Cornish pixies.

"Um... sorry for that," the boy started, shaking Harry's hand. The handshake was weak, the hand itself cold and flaccid, like a dead fish. "Mistook you for someone else. There's just a guy here..."

"I understand." Even if he didn't. Harry nodded and tried for a smile. "I hear it's tough attending Arianrhod sometimes, plenty of enemies and what not-"

"Not really an enemy," the boy, obviously a fairy of some sort, cut Harry off. "A dormmate."

"Oh." Harry hoped the boy wasn't _his_ dormmate. Or at least refrained from hexing all his dormmates on sight every day. "I'll be living here, too, now."

The boy nodded, looking unsure as he shot Harry a gauging look, scrutinising him and attempting to calculate Harry's strengths and weakness, see if he were a worthy opponent... That left Harry rather disconcerted. In Hogwarts people never truly assessed each other before dumping a load of hatred on the other. In Gryffindor especially you just proclaimed your liking for a person casually, or punched him in the face if you disliked him. So simple.

A suspicion nagged Harry that the method of "See a Twit – Hit the Twit" wouldn't work much.

"My name is Zolin Lewis," the boy broke Harry out of his thinking. He shrugged a bony shoulder, which looked so frail Harry imagined it might snap if pressed too tight. "Weather faerie." He threw Harry a warning look. "We are _not_ useless."

Something darker, conceited and ugly reared its head in the weather faerie's mint orbs for a second – which really looked like orbs, because they were much larger than an ordinary person's – but Harry dismissed it as a pride in one's race. Merlin knew purebloods were guilty of that vanity, too.

Harry raised his hands to placate Zolin. Wouldn't do to forge animosities on his first day.

"Hey, cool off! I never said you are. I don't even know what a weather faerie _is_."

Zolin opened his mouth, appalled at his ignorance, then snapped it shut.

"I guess we'll get along then. Better stick to together here, because our three dormmates are utter prats." His lips quirked upwards shakily in a weak grin. "You're lucky you've met me first. I swear, when I entered this room for the first time and came face to face with that mass of werebear muscle..."

"A werebear?" Harry's eyes widened. "Wait, they actually exist? I mean, I know about werewolves, of course, but-"

"Wolves, bears, and foxes." A frown crinkled Zolin's forehead. "Who are you? You don't know about my weather faeries, don't know about werebears..." He looked Harry up and down with critical eyes. "At first I thought you to be a veela or an incubus, because you certainly look pretty enough-" Harry blushed at the compliment. "-but you don't exude the allure, so-"

"A human," Harry interrupted Zolin's train of thought. Admitting it made him rather nervous. Not everyone would be human-friendly here, Headmistress Silverain had warned them. "A human from Human World. My name is Hadrian Laurifer. You may call me Harry for short."

Harry stole a glance at Zolin, but the weather faerie seemed stuck on his first phrase.

"A- a human? Really?" he stuttered out dubiously. Harry frowned. He didn't appreciate people staring at him again. Especially not his dormmate.

"Yes," he snapped, deciding that he just as well should see his own room now. To discern which one of the doors belonged to him now wasn't hard: all the rooms had the same copper plaques as on the outside, bar one. Harry headed for it.

When he reached his room, he heard footsteps retreating elsewhere.

He sighed. All his previous glee evaporated.

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	4. Midir, Grunwald, and Battle Spells

Thanks so much for your reviews! All of them!

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Chapter 4. Midir, Grunwald, and Battle Spells

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Tired, Harry wiped his sweaty forehead with the back of his hand. He shifted his eyes to observe the result of his hard work.

The room didn't comprise much: a bed, a desk, a bookcase, and a wardrobe. All plain and without any carvings or decorations, allowing students to let their imagination run free and do the room up themselves. Harry's trunk peeked out from the vast space under the desk. He didn't have many memorabilia with him, and the books he had only filled up less than a quarter of the available shelves, so all in all the place looked bare and dreary.

'Well, I have some years to liven it. If I don't get killed or die of this mystery disease first, of course.'

Harry supposed he should do some revising for his classes, maybe borrow a book or two in the library, but his desire to explore won out in the end, like it always did. Bo matter what, he couldn't just become another Hermione with a nose constantly up some dusty tome on the Freedom-for-House-Elves movement.

Which reminded him...

Oh yes, he had to look up the races that attended Arianrhod. The next-door bloke had baffled Harry, so his determination in running to an encyclopaedia of a sort only steeled.

Or he could ask Hermione.

Harry sighed and stood up as he made up his mind to drag his arse out of the room and into the world.

Trouble always sought him, and sometimes he aided its search, but the adventurous Potter genes took the reins in his heart. He didn't see the Lewis guy (was it fairy? Pixie?), but heard rambunctious laughter ringing off the walls, coming from the kitchen, and he caught sight of broad shoulders and a thick mane of dark red hair.

Still, Harry was in no mood to socialise now. He walked out of the lounge-

To bump into a very hard chest. It hurt.

"Watch where you are going, boy," a silky but very irritated voice snapped down at him. Harry stepped back to glare up at the guy.

The appearance of the man startled him.

The person – certainly not human, judging by the split irises drowning in swirling violet eyes – had black hair gelled back to display the sharp angles of his tanned face. His clothes surprised Harry: the colour was an ordinary dark blue of various hues, but the cut and the ornaments didn't ring a bell. Probably was yet another Creature-Realm thing.

The man raised his eyebrows at Harry's blatant observation.

"Checking me out now? How impudent. I'll let you know I don't fuck food, and you don't seem much like anything more."

Harry flushed an angry red.

"Excuse me? I don't believe you-" Harry stumbled on the next word. "-fuck at all, simply because your over-inflated ego would put a damper on any mood."

The stranger's eyes widened before narrowing as he leaned in to regard Harry closer. Harry bore the scrutinise with a frosty exterior and a bubbling hot rage inside.

He rarely lashed out. Hardly at all, actually. And then he remembered his time limit, and remembered how dangerous Arianrhod could be if you let people walk over you, and decided to change his attitude. Step by step, starting from now.

"So you have some backbone, boy. Weird, considering the invertebrates Lewis hangs out with," the violet-eyed man drawled. "Does he believe you'll ward his offenders off? Spineless pile of maggots, always running to others for protection... Just warning you then: he gets what he gets, and however pretty you are, I will smash your skull into a hundred splinters if you think of helping him. Merlin knows he deserves everything we dish out at him."

A pang of compassion for that odd weather faerie pierced Harry's heart at that. He knew all too well what it felt like to be bullied. Now he was talking with another bully, the sort of Malfoy and Dudley and, heck, even Voldemort. He felt sick.

A veneer of intangible frost covered Harry's eyes.

"I'm not his protector, whatever that means. But if I see you harming him with no cause at all, I will step in. And I'm not his friend. I'm just his new neighbour," Harry finished in a steely voice, eyeing the other warily. A gleam of interest flickered in violet.

"Oh? Fascinating. You might be interested to hear that people don't survive long in our block. Especially Lewis's sympathisers." The strange-eyed man snorted, as if at a joke Harry didn't understand. "Not that he has many, mind."

"And isn't it easy to fight the unarmed?" Harry asked with acid sarcasm. His fingers clenched into fists.

"The unarmed? Perhaps he is. In a verbal spar especially, or when it comes to studies. But it doesn't mean he is defenceless," the older man waved him off, comfortably leaning against the door. Even if Harry wanted to escape, the body was blocking his way.

"I don't understand," Harry said with a frown, puzzled.

"Don't worry, I don't begrudge you this lack of cognitive abilities to understand the simplest of phrases. I really don't," the man drawled with a sardonic smile playing across his full lips.

Harry wanted to strangle him. And he wasn't violent for thinking so.

"Now run off wherever." The man mockingly stepped away from the door and made a show of bowing in its direction. "You are so low on the list of my priorities at the moment that chatting with you kills my time. Study and move up the ranks of Arianrhod, and I might just consider acknowledging you someday."

"It's a shame that I won't return the favour," Harry replied with a sweet smile.

Here the other actually had the gall to outright laugh.

"I am Midir Catus, boy," the man – and finally Harry had the name to connect with the face – forced out through the chuckles. "People fall over themselves to get to know me. Be honoured to share the dorm with a celebrity, however long it lasts."

"Aren't you supposed to be more concerned with your public image then?" Harry demanded. He was reluctantly curious. As much of a bastard as the other was, Midir fascinated Harry with his lack of fawning over the Boy-Who-Lived, even if the other didn't know who he was talking to.

...And didn't it just sound sort of conceited? Well, the title of the great Saviour did bring some fame with it.

Midir gave him a slow smile. His violet eyes glistened mysteriously.

"When you have the power, you will find that what people actually think of you matters little so long as they oblige."

IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi 

After some searching through the school Harry discovered the library, the dining hall, the training rooms, and the classrooms where his first classes would be. Arianrhod's grounds also included a vast forest, so huge that he couldn't see the end of it, two Quidditch pitches, stables, a river – and that was all Harry could see out of the windows, since he didn't venture outside yet, preserving it for another day. He was tired already.

In many ways the school resembled Hogwarts in its atmosphere of magic and mystery, but the doors and staircases were fixed, and Hogwarts didn't have such a dark air of sheer danger in it. Not to mention the carvings that depicted scenes from legends and possible myths, all moving and fascinating to watch.

When hunger reared its ugly head, Harry walked down to the dining hall. In Hogwarts he always hated that time because other students always observed and judged him, always giggled and pointed and whispered and stared...

Nightmarish.

So, the lack of interest in Arianrhod pleasantly surprised him. His eyes browsed through the dining hall filled with round tables of different sizes until they stopped at the sight of Hermione who waved to him.

Walking up to his friends, a greeting on his lips, he noted that they both seemed tired, if not worn out.

"How's business?" he asked warily as Hermione handed him the menu. His finger rigidly tapped the "human course" option.

Ron groaned, a piece of meat falling out of his mouth. Hermione smacked him on the head.

"Are your roommates utter jerks, too?"

"Ron!" Harry's other best friend chided before he had the chance to open his mouth in reply. "I'm sure they just... had a bad day."

"If you call every day a bad one," Ron muttered in response.

Harry hid his smile with a glass of juice. He wasn't sure what sort it was, but luckily not from a pumpkin; he wouldn't have been able to ward off the nostalgia otherwise.

"Well, to be honest, my own dorm mates aren't a walk in the park either," Harry admitted, still sipping at his juice.

"How so?" Hermione's face scrunched up in concern. "They don't bully you, don't they? If they offend or hit or hex you-"

"Relax, Hermione. No one's bullying anyone," Harry laughed her off before scowling. "Not me, anyway. I've met only two guys so far, and one seems to be harassing the other... But, dunno, the victim does look harmless, but there's something unpleasant about him." Harry glared mutinously into his meal. "Not that I won't defend him if others truly gang up on him for no reason at all."

"I-" Hermione wavered before taking Harry's hand in hers. The teen didn't miss the way Ron stopped eating to stare jealously at their intertwined hands. "Never thought I'd tell you so, but please wait before doing anything rash. Including defending someone. One of my dorm mates explained it to me; some people here are not what they seem, and others have bone-deep grudges that are there for a reason. Don't rush into danger until you're sure that this person doesn't deserve it."

Harry nodded sharply.

"Yes. That's what I think of doing. Still, I'll intervene if someone's about to kill a person in front of me. Even grudges and offenses have their limits."

"Please, people," Ron butted in, "this talk of killing is killing my appetite. Can't we speak about... birds? Good weather? Quidditch?"

"As if anything can destroy your appetite," Harry said with a chuckle and a smile. "I swear if you could marry food, you would."

Ron shook his head sagely. "Nah, once you eat food, it's over. I'd rather marry a chef. Then it keeps coming forever."

"And how about you stop paying that great deal of attention to it at all?" Hermione questioned, steely undertones in her voice. Harry stifled a wince.

"What about you dorm mates, Ron?" Harry asked quickly to prevent a yet another quarrel from breaking out.

Hermione tossed him a glare that showed clearly how unimpressed she was. Ron fidgeted, stopping the stuffing of his mouth with food.

"One's touched in the head, another scares the living lights out of me, the third..." Ron shuddered and looked at his meal as of repulsed.

"He told me his one of his neighbours is... excessively amorous," Hermione explained with a touch of red dusting her cheeks.

"Loudly so."

Harry winced. Now that was something he wouldn't want in his dorm. In Hogwarts they always used silencing charms to created the needed air of privacy for some alone-time, and no one could hope to take a girlfriend into the room... Harry couldn't imagine how out of depth and flustered Ron might feel.

Then he wondered about his own dorm mates.

"It's so different," Hermione said after a pause. Her voice washed over them in wistful notes. "Sometimes I can't believe we've done it. All that we know is left behind, and everyone is so cold here, everything is either impersonal or too personal – like grudges and feuds and animosities, and no one cares if someone id killed... We are so not used to this."

"But we are used to changes," Harry whispered. He took one of her hands in his, clenching it, while Ron did the same with the other. "Especially us two, Hermione. There was a day we didn't believe in magic. But we built a life for ourselves in the magical world. Here it is the same situation. Our past is destroyed, but our future lies ahead."

And all three ignored the ticking of Harry's clock, and all three ignored the thoughts of England back in Human Realm, under the Vodemort-controlled Ministry.

IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi IiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIiIi 

Coming to school after summer was always a tough affair. Harry found out that Arianrhod didn't differ much from Hogwarts in that regard.

He quickly stuffed himself with breakfast – muffins! Only that was enough to make the day shine – before rushing to his first class – Battle Spells.

All groups in Arianrhod were quite small so as to allow more concentrated attention on an individual student, so Harry was amongst the last to arrive, even if the classroom seemed only half-full. Others mostly sat by themselves, but Harry found the place beside Ron already occupied by whom Ron had deemed his only bearable neighbour. Shrugging, he strolled to the first row.

They didn't have to wait for long for the class to start.

"Now, punks, there's no slacking off in my class," a booming voice echoed through the classroom as the door swung open. "If you can't keep up, you're out. If you whine, you're out. If you're dead, you're out. Everything is clear?"

The class was stumped silent.

"If speech is too much for your non-existent brains to grasp, blink three times for 'yes'," the man bit out, and everyone immediately snapped out of their stupor.

Harry's eyes roamed over the (most likely, he didn't know anymore) werewolf. Although the man's hair was streaked with dark grey strands, he didn't look old, and his vivid glaring amber eyes so much like Remus's only added to the impressions of joviality and youth. His black shirt was open to reveal a mighty chest with scars running down on it, some of them reaching his neck, while leather trousers hugged strong legs. He was majestic: a paragon of power, both physical and magical.

"My name is Nicon Grunwald," their teacher continued sharply. His eyes dug in like daggers into anyone who dared meet his gaze. "You will call me Professor Grunwald. Someday, if I deem you worthy enough, you may earn the right to use my first name." He sneered, swiping them with another observant glance. "By the looks of it, not many of you punks will succeed.

"My class is a practical one. If you've noticed, there aren't any books assigned. That's because there aren't any. Only a living being and experience can teach you how to fight, not a moronic dust-gatherer for dummies. You will turn to books when you are in need of engorging your arsenal of spells, but I will teach you the tricks of how to use what you already know with a minimal waste of magical power."

Harry listened to the man explain how exhausting duelling spells could be, and how people couldn't afford to feel tired in a battle. When someone moved to take down notes, Grunwald made a fist to appear out of thin air to smack this unfortunate bloke.

"No notes in my class. No quills, no ink. I will allow only your memory to guide you. Only your logic and natural abilities will reign here."

And so it continued until he apparently decided he was sick of talking. At Grunwald's beckoning, the entire class including Harry rose from their seats and followed him through a door near the blackboard. Harry found himself in a huge bare room with dummies lying at one of the walls like a battlefield of broken dolls. He shivered. Their empty eyes and tangled limbs created a gloomy impression.

"We will conduct out lessons here. Sometimes, you will work with training dolls, and sometimes you will pair up. There will also be wall-on-wall lessons, when you will divide into two or three groups and fight it out with each other."

A hand belonging to a girl sprung up into the air. Grunwald shot her a sharp look.

"Questions?"

"Yes. One. What about Duelling Tournaments? Will we have a team this year? And how do we apply?"

That tickled Harry's interest. The talk of a tournament left a bitter taste in his mouth, reminding him of Cedric's tragic death and Voldemort's unfortunate return, but he liked the idea of duelling. Besides, he had steeled himself to the idea of forgetting professional Quidditch for the time being, but training himself in Duelling would be advantageous, too, instead of being a frivolous pleasure.

"If you duel as well as you count, I doubt you will have many chances of being accepted into one," Grunwald said icily. "I will judge your abilities for a month before deciding whom to include into a team. I will choose three punks from this group, and so will the teachers from the other groups. The chosen ones will have to fight it out between themselves, and so the final team of seven will be made up. I will give you a heads up at the beginning of October, when enough time will have passed to safely determine the best of you."

Harry made a mental note to ask others what the teams were about and what advantage it gave to make part of one. He just wasn't asking Ron. The redhead – and wasn't it odd to see him almost shaven! – wore a dumb look on his face, the one Harry supposed his own countenance mirrored.

"Now, I have to see what level you're at," Grunwald barked at them, effectively stopping all the whispers that had spread at his information. "Each of you will grab a training doll there, scribble your name on it, and cast the strongest curses and hexes you know at it. Today I will be just determining the force of your spell-casting, so they won't respond you. The next lesson will surprise you."

The nasty smirk on his face didn't leave Harry with an impression that he would _like_ to be surprised.

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Harry – astoundingly – enjoyed the rest of the lesson. For all his drawbacks and a snappy disposition, Grunwald's mode of teaching allowed students to figure things out for themselves.

He didn't simply step back to observe and occasionally jeer at them, like Harry had suspected he would at first, but walked amongst them and corrected the way they held their wands, pronounced the spells, outlined the wand motions.

He individually explained their shortcomings ("Punk! The blinding mist and the bombardment hex do _not_ mix when your aim is worse than a drunk house elf's!"), the amount of magic one had to pour in not to overpower the spell ("Yes, you can keep on overpowering it. This way when you cast a strong explosion curse, the world will contain one moron less."), the uses of a jinx ("I _thought_ the effects of a blasting hex are self-explanatory. You don't use it to punish a pet when it annoys you."), and the like.

Harry relaxed and allowed his natural instincts to take hold of his body, guiding it into precise wand movements and carefully articulating the incantations with his mouth. Other students were preoccupied with their own work, so he didn't feel bad for trying even some of the more unusual, darker shades of magic he would never have dared to try out at Hogwarts.

Guilty happiness swelled inside him.

So engrossed he was that he utterly missed the considering look that amber eyes regarded him with.

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Advanced Charms passed with no incidents and much less excitement. Along with Hermione he had taken ordinary notes and listened to the explanation. An elderly elf conducted the lesson without any yells or derision, but also with no practice yet, which would start from next lesson. As the teacher had said, they would have one or two lessons devoted entirely to theory, and then several practical lessons until they have perfected that part of material.

When Harry arrived to the dorm, he didn't glimpse dark red hair in the kitchen, and didn't hear anyone. So, he simply retired to his room to do the assigned Charms essay.

A surprise awaited him when he dragged himself out of the room for an energising cup of tea. At the table, with a thick notebook filled with runic script in front of him, there sat the bastard from earlier, Midir Catus.

"Evening," Harry muttered tiredly, reaching for the kettle.

Midir let out a noncommittal sound as he corrected a symbol with a flourish.

"Not talking with those without power, huh?"

"Got it in one, little boy," Midir mocked. His eyes were still locked on the pages of his... research journal?

Harry's cheeks reddened as he bit out, "Do not call me 'little boy'! My name is-"

"If I cared about it, I would have found it out by now. Save your breath." Midir took a long sip of whatever he drank. When he sat the cup back on the table, Harry saw it filled with a sickeningly black liquid, thick and repulsive and smelling vaguely like rotten wood.

"Has anybody ever told you how rude you are?"

"Yes. They never had a tongue to talk again," the older male warned Harry lightly. The latter frowned.

"Are you always this... bloodthirsty?"

"It's the truth. I prefer not to lie when I can help it."

"Why do I get the feeling that you are lying now," Harry deadpanned. Midir's lips stretched into an enigmatic smirk.

"Aren't you a clever little boy? Yes, I'm lying. You are lying. Everyone is lying. And..." Abruptly, he clutched the front of Harry's shirt and brought the teen's head closer, whispering into his ear so close that his lips grazed the shell, "They are lying when they pretend to be harmless or pacifistic." He moved away, his face a cold mask now. "Just a hint for you regarding some people you will or have met and are suddenly inclined to protect."

Harry suddenly didn't want his tea so much anymore.

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Btw, d'you want me to retain Harry's POV (almost) all the time, or are you okay with me switching it every now and then?

And PLEASE review! And reply to the poll on my profile :)

If you are good, I might update next week. I have exams now, but the one I'll have next Tuesday's very easy, so I might spare some time to write after this Thursday.


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